Adult Book Club, Literary Sojourn Author Study : The Master

This distinguished Irish novelist boldly offers a fictional depiction of the last two decades of the life of the great god of American letters, Henry James. We come in on James at a low point in his career, the 1895 failure on the London stage of his play Guy Domville. This setback ignites months of lethargy and pain and disappointment. What Toibin has so boldly done--and done so brilliantly and successfully--is forge a sympathetic but not mushy imagining of James' interior life at this crossroads, a picture that renders the Master astonishingly lifelike. Toibin gives him ordinary human qualities, such as fear and loneliness and longing, in a shaping and shading process that has not been an easy task, even in the most thoughtful, scrupulously researched biography. Obviously, by Toibin's illustration, fiction is the best way to achieve such a result, the best approach to infusing this somewhat cold, distant, and removed-from-real-life literary icon with an embracing degree of warmth and humanity. Even the reader who knows little about Henry James or his work can enjoy this marvelously intelligent and engaging novel, which presents not on a silver platter but in tender, opened hands a beautifully nuanced psychological portrait. --Brad Hooper Copyright 2004 Booklist

About Literary Sojourn Author Study

The Literary Sojourn Author Study is a series of book discussion programs designed to enhance the experience of reading for this year's Literary Sojourn. Participants read and discuss works from each of the featured authors prior to the live event on September Oct. 20, 2014. Bud Werner Memorial Library's Michelle Dover facilitates the free discussions and the study is limited to 15 participants per meeting. Register for this session using the online registration form or call Michelle at 970-367-4907